ANC party can't disguise South Africa divide

South Africa's ruling African National Congress staged a mass rally to celebrate its centenary on Sunday but the display could not disguise divisions and disillusionment in its ranks.

The leadership led a three-day party for an estimated 100,000 supporters, members and politicians who, along with 14 African heads of state, descended on the Free State city of Bloemfontein, where it was founded in 1912.

But without an appearance by
Nelson Mandela
, its revered but frail former leader, and scant acknowledgement by President
Jacob Zuma
of the problems facing the party, the mood was subdued.

Winnie
Mandikizela-Mandela, the former wife of Mr Mandela, was present as was ex-president
Thabo Mbeki
and Julius Malema, the former head of the party's youth league. All three represented potential flashpoints that party managers were keen to keep in the background.

The 100 million rand ($13.6 million) party was a church service, a pop concert, a seven-hour gala dinner and a poetry reading session.

The planners staged a golf tournament with politicians and business backers paying 25,000 rand each to play.

Mr Zuma gave a 90-minute speech, where he recalled the organisation's proud history in leading the struggle against apartheid.

"The ANC mobilised the South African people across the racial, gender and class divide. The ANC, a disciplined force of the Left with a bias toward the poor, is also a broad church that is home to all," he said.

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But he could not entirely ignore the party's recent travails. "During this year, 2012, we must renew our determination to build a South Africa founded on the principles of the democratic constitution," he said. "We must bring new energy and new ideas of the kind of society we want to build over the next few decades.

"We will take urgent and practical steps to once again place the ANC at the forefront of the progressive forces for change."

While some of his audience listened intently and joined in enthusiastically with the odd struggle song, several thousand streamed out of the stadium as storm clouds gathered overhead and Mr Zuma's halting lecture entered its second hour.

Susan Mabaso, 59, a street hawker from Soweto who travelled to Bloemfontein on one of the free buses put on by the ANC, said: "We're glad to be here and we're proud of our organisation, but we're still hungry, we're still struggling."

The ANC's role in the peaceful transition to majority black rule that came with Mr Mandela's ascent to power in 1994 remains its signature accomplishment.

But it has struggled to make much headway in improving education and health, or eradicating the informal settlements that sprawl outwards from its cities.

Today, South Africa is one of the most unequal countries in the world, and few but a small, politically connected black elite have seen major benefits from the change in regime.

Mr Zuma suggested that the ANC had moved away from some of the values espoused by great leaders such as Oliver Tambo and Mr Mandela and acknowledged that there were "challenges" in the years ahead.

As the president and his colleagues on a stage erected in the centre of the stadium clinked champagne glasses and ate pieces of a giant birthday cake, the mood in the crowd was mixed.

Mothusi Matlholwa, 43, an IT consultant from Johannesburg, said he had hoped to hear a more detailed plan for the future from Mr Zuma.

Mina Tladi, 64, an ANC ward leader in Bloemfontein, struck a more positive note, saying the debt people owed the party was still greater than its shortcomings.

"We are old ladies now and didn't think we'd make it to see the ANC's 100 years," she said. "We have grown up with the organisation, it has made us what we are."

UK Prime MInister David Cameron
congratulated Mr Zuma and the ANC "on this very special anniversary".

"The African National Congress has been a beacon for the world in the fight against discrimination and the struggle for freedom from oppression – it stood up for the rights of all South Africans. It is incredible to see the changes in South Africa that the ANC has helped to bring about," he said.